The Honourable Sophia Leigh
(1838-1926)
14 May 1861

Volume 3, page 234, sitting number 3618.

[The sitter is identified in the Silvy daybooks as the ‘H.ble Sophia Leigh’ and on the album page as ‘Sophy Leveson-Gower.’ The latter appears to be a clipped autograph. The portrait was taken a week before her marriage. The following sitting in the daybooks is her fiancé.]

Born on 21 January 1838, the Honourable Sophia Leigh was the daughter of Chandos, Leigh, who in 1839 was raised to the peerage as 1st Baron Leigh of Stoneleigh. 

On 21 May 1861 she married Granville William Gresham Leveson-Gower, son of William Leveson-Gower and Emily Josephine Eliza née Doyle. Their marriage produced ten children.

The Honourable Mrs Leveson-Gower died on 12 July 1926 at the age of 88.

‘The death occurred on Sunday evening at “Hookwood,” Limpsfield, Surrey, of the Hon. Mrs Leveson-Gower, daughter of the first Lord Leigh and twin sister of the Dean of Hereford. She was 88. The funeral will take place at Titsey, Surrey, on Thursday.

‘Mrs Leveson-Gower’s eight sons achieved cricket fame almost equal to that of the eight Lytteltons, the best known, of course, being H.D.G. Leveson-Gower, who was at one time captain of the Surrey eleven’ (Daily News, 13 July 1926). 

[From an album compiled by Bertha Amelia Yorke, daughter of the Very Rev. and Hon. Grantham Munton Yorke.]